SIF Program 2013
MA Department of Elementary and Secondary Education
Executive Office Of Education
William A. Holscher – State SIF Program Manager
What is SIF?
Schools Interoperability Framework™ (SIF) - the
first, largest, and most implemented open global
standard for seamless, real time data transfer and
usage.
The SIF Association is an international open source
consortium that developed the standard for the
education industry.
Copyright ©2007 Schools Interoperability Framework (SIF™) Association. All Rights Reserved.
Interoperability Framework
Copyright ©2007 Schools Interoperability Framework (SIF™) Association. All Rights Reserved.
MA SIF Program 2013 Goals
On-Board 234 RTTT
districts by 12/31/2013
Relationship to other
projects :
SIF Districts will feed the
Edwin Teaching and
Learning System
State SIF Vendor
Certification begins
3/15/2013
SIF District On-boarding
begins 4/18/2013
SIF Districts Will feed
Edwin Analytics
SCS will be part of the SIF
Program 2013
SIF Districts will integrate
with Student Claiming
Ultimate MA SIF Program
goal is to On Board all 448
school districts by 6/30/2014
MA SIF Program Overview
• The MA SIF Program 2013 is a rebaseline for the
previous initiative and chartered to implement lessons
learned during the October 2012 SIF Project rollout.
• The MA SIF data collection is an ongoing initiative
that has established an initial 2013 eleven object
requirement that is comprised of fifty-two SIMS,
thirteen SCS and seven EPIMS data elements.
• The standards, policies and procedures established
from this initiative are designed to be rolled forward
for all future annual SIF Program data element and
application enhancements
Lessons Learned
Program Management
• ESE/EOE Steering Committee Oversight
• Weekly Program Scope, Schedule and Cost
Reported
• Individual Projects Report through
Program
Agent Vendors
SIF Districts On-Boarding
• New Agent Vendor State SIF Certification
Strategy and Process will be established.
• Agent Vendor State SIF Certification will be
required prior to District On Boarding.
• Agent Vendor State SIF Certification has its
own project plan.
• Third party vendor resources will be utilized
to develop and execute new On Boarding
process.
• Comprehensive District On Boarding
Communication, Documentation, Training,
and Data Support will be provided.
• SIF District On Boarding has its own project
plan.
Enhanced Architecture
 Stricter SIF Agent Security Standards being adopted
 Level 3 authentication and Level 4 encryption
 Application Architecture Strengthened
 District SIF Agent to Publish real-time events
MA SIF Data Flow
Production State: District Perspective
District Level
SIS
Publishing
Agent (push)
Teaching and Learning
ESE ZIS
Stage
Other ZIS (e.g. SLC)
Team Resources
ESE Data
Collections
New State Test
Environments
ESE Data
Quality
Agent Vendors
Team
Resources will
be incremental,
scalable, and
available as
needed.
IT Support and
outside services
Dev
QA
Staging
Districts
Three Phase District SIF Process
 Phase I – District Agent Vendor Certification


Vendor successfully certifies in MA SIF Test Environment
Vendor Dress Rehearsal District successfully enters production
 Phase II – District Pre-Onboarding Process





SIF Training
Documentation Walkthrough
Data Quality Validation Checks
SIF Connectivity Check
Dedicated SIF program Onboarding Support
 Phase III - Onboarding Process



Connecting district to the State SIF UAT test environment
Sending all SIF data to the State for quality assurance testing
Connecting district to the State SIF Production environment upon successful UAT
testing
District SIF Documentation
 Enhanced SIF Reporting Guide designed in
conjunction with District Vendor and specifically
targeted to seamlessly integrate with current SIS
application documentation.

Includes Best Practices
 Data Quality Validation Checklist designed to assist
Districts and Schools verify data for SIF compliance
prior to on-boarding with State.
The Future with SIF
 Standard framework by which all data will flow
 Real-Time SASID Assignment
 EPIMS Reporting
 Real-Time Student Claiming and Un-claiming
 Enhanced State Reporting
 District to District data sharing
Questions
[email protected]